Unlike dry skin which is a skin type, dehydrated skin is a skin condition which depends on your genetics and can thankfully be treated. Your skin dehydrates if your skin barrier remains out of barrier for too long as this is when your skin loses its ability at maintaining its water content levels. Like every other beauty topic, there are also some myths associated with dehydrated skin.

Myth no.1: It’s enough to treat dehydrated skin by just drinking more water.

This is partly true as while you need to drink water, it does not treat your skin dehydration problem. While it’s true that our bodies are made of 75% water and all cells constitute mainly of water, the dead skin cells on the skin surface have no or minimal moisture content.

So in such cases, no matter how much of water you drink, it does not hydrate your skin. Of course, drinking water offers other benefits to your body like making you healthier and have better skin health, but it does not treat the main cause for dehydrated skin.

Myth no.2: Dehydrated skin just has to be scrubbed away.

False. Though your first reaction would be to exfoliate or scrub away all the flakiness which appears on your dehydrated skin surface, don’t. This is because this itself is a sign that you need to heed as the flakiness and dry patches of skin indicates that your skin is so out of balance that it is irritated and heading to a skin problem.

This is when you need to try to bring back your skin to its former equilibrium by getting the basics right. You need to use a gentle balancing cleanser, a well formulated moisturizer with sun protection and a rehydrating serum with hyaluronic acid to do this.

Myth no.3: It helps if you spray a water mist.

False. Of course, it’s a good idea spraying some water to your face to refresh yourself as its easy and convenient when you are on the go. However spraying your face with just water without any added serum or moisturizers to lock your moisture in will not benefit your dehydrated skin in any way at all.

In fact, spraying just plain water will lead to more complications as the sprayed water evaporates into the atmosphere with some water from your skin too. This is especially common in an airplane or an air-conditioned room where moisture is sucked out of the atmosphere. It’s better if you buy a humidifier and a good facial oil full of essential fatty acids.